Life Is but a Dream
by Kotodashi Kyoshi
Summary: "Row, row, row your boat...life is but a dream." War made everyone a little crazy.


Author's note: Written for round 5 for the QLFC. Keeper for the Kestrels. Prompt- Phantom zone/Prison Dimension. AU write about a place where the worst criminals are imprisoned.

There are mentions of rape so consider this a trigger warning.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the iPad I'm currently working on.

* * *

"Row, row, row your boat. Gently down the stream. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily. Life is but a dream."

Her voice was small and hoarse. Like she'd been screaming for hours and barely had anything left. There was a wild, crazed look in her eyes, reminding him too much of his aunt Bellatrix.

He hated this version of her the most.

Draco never knew which persona he was going to get. Never knew if he'd wake to a sullen and silent Hermione, an angry and vengeful one, or a lost and crazy one. He didn't even know what day it was.

The war had been won by Voldemort. Harry Potter was dead. Ronald Weasley was in hiding, at least he had been when Draco was thrown in prison. Lucius and Narcissa had been killed in front of him for switching sides during the battle at Hogwarts. He'd been forced to pretend like he hadn't cared about any of it for weeks. Until he finally snapped.

They'd brought in a prisoner. _The _prisoner; Undesirable number one. Hermione Granger. Bossy, know-it-all, swot extraordinaire.

Love of his life.

Voldemort tried punishing him for all his wrong-doings by having him beat her. By having him rape her. And he'd done it, because better by his hand than by anyone else's. Right?

Draco had hoped that she understood that. That he was doing her a favor. But then Voldemort grew tired of watching Draco "take it easy" on the Mudblood.

So he'd called for Greyback, and Draco had panicked. So he'd done the only thing he could think of to save her.

Now, Hermione Granger was dead.

That would be the last of his failures. And for it, Draco had been thrown into a place worse than Azkaban. He imagined it was what Hell would be like. Sometimes, he wondered if maybe he had actually been killed and was in Hell.

There were no cells, no chairs, no cots for him to sit or lay on. Draco just…_was. _Time didn't exist in this place. This evil place that he would be forced to endure for the rest of his natural life. Just when he thought he'd faint from starvation or dehydration, food or drink would appear. It was never much, just enough to get him by. If he refused to drink or eat, instead choosing to waste away so he could be free of this miserable place, he'd lose time and wake to find that the food and drink had been consumed.

Voldemort called it _Tin Erimiá, _which translated into The Wasteland. But there was no land, no sea, there was simply nothing. Draco hadn't seen the sunlight, rain or even snow, in however long he'd been in there. Only the crazed brunette that had stolen his heart in their sixth year, before everything went to shit. She was the only thing that ever came to him.

"..gently down the stream. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily. Life is but a dream."

Draco turned to Hermione and fell to his knees, clasping his hands in front of him. "Hermione, please PLEASE stop singing that horrid song!"

She gasped, turning her wild eyes from whatever she'd been staring at, to him. Recoiling into an unseen corner, she started to shake and he could hear soft mewling cries coming from her. "Then he skinned the crow and cut her in pieces, she weighed near sixteen and twenty pounds…"

Draco's blood ran cold in his veins. She was always muttering cryptic lines like this. Soon would come the cawing.

He couldn't handle the cawing.

"CAW…CAW…CAW…CAW!"

0o0

"I never loved you."

A burst of black feathers and here was another persona. He'd been alone for hours…days…he didn't know. She was holding bread in one hand and a glass of water in another.

"I could care less if you lived or not." Hermione spoke like her words were knives, throwing them at Draco in hopes they would cut deep.

"You're not real!" Draco shouted at her.

She laughed. A deep throated chuckle like she truly thought he was funny. "Are you still alive, Draco? I'm not. You killed me. You left me to rot in the hands of the Death Eaters you stood beside. You murdered for him, you raped for him. Yet, he stuck you in here to waste the rest of your days away. Aren't you stupid?"

Draco snarled and lunged at her. But only the bread and water were there, laying on the ground in front of him. He moved towards it, shuffling heavy chains across the floor.

But there was no floor.

He was falling. Black feathers floating all around him.

0o0

She was pressed to him, skin on skin, basking in a dewy afterglow. He didn't remember any of it.

"You love me. Don't you, Draco?" Her voice was solid, and pure. She sounded just like she had the night she'd first asked him the same question.

But it couldn't be real. Could it?

"Of course I do." He kissed the top of her head while reaching down to grab her hand.

It was soft, and didn't quite feel right. Draco looked down and realized she was covered in black feathers. Her eyes gone completely black, staring up at him.

"Liar…liar…liar." She chanted.

"Liar…liar…liaw…law…caw…caw…CAW!"

0o0

"Draco! Wake up!"

The sound of her voice draws him from sleep. He shoots up in bed, sweaty, and she's right there.

"You were having a nightmare. You were thrashing and kicking about. Are you alright?"

He stared at her for a few moments before reaching out and gently touching her face. She was solid. She was real. He crushed her to his chest and breathed in her scent.

"I'm sorry!" He cried.

"Shhh. Shhh. You're ok. I'll go warm you up some milk, ok?"

Draco nodded as she ran a hand through his hair and leaned forward to kiss his forehead.

She's gone for all of five minutes before returning with a mug of warm milk. He drinks it greedily, feeling like he hasn't properly eaten or drank anything in ages.

But then…something doesn't taste right.

He frowns and reaches into his mouth, coughing as he pulls out a small black feather.

"Sing a song of sixpence, a pocketful of rye," Hermione began to sing. "Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie."

She started to giggle as she got on her hands and knees, crawling towards him as she sang the rest of her twisted lullaby. He started to panic and pushed himself against the headboard of the bed as she came closer.

"When down came a blackbird and pecked off her nose!" She reaches forward and grabbed his nose between her thumb and index finger.

Draco's breath caught in his throat as Hermione's giggles turned into shrill caws.

There were feathers everywhere.

He was falling again, but there was nothing around him.

Nothing but Hermione's voice ringing out all around him.

"CAW…CAW…CAW."

It's black. He can't see anything. All he hears is her voice, faintly singing.

"Row, row, row your boat…"

He can't see anything but tries to find her anyway.

"...life is but a dream."

"Draco? Wake up my love. You're having a nightmare. "

* * *

The second lullaby Hermione is reciting is from "Kråkevisa" which is a Norwegian lullaby.

I got the idea for the cawing and the crows from Game of Thrones. "Crows are all liars." It's kind of a metaphor for their relationship in lieu of all that happened.

Some parts of this may have seemed like they didn't flow, but imagine if you were living in a hell prison. What would it be like? Living broken parts of scenes that weren't really happening. So I ask that the judges take this into consideration when scoring.


End file.
